Tony Fernandes: Change is important
Air Asia founder believes Malaysians enjoy being “spoon-fed” by the government and “do not like change”.
Lisa J. Ariffin, FMT
Tony Fernandes believes that most Malaysians rely on the government too much and are not susceptible to change.
The Air Asia Group CEO said today that organisations – whether political or private companies – need frequent change in leadership in order to progress.
“The problem with Malaysia is that when people stay too long in their positions. They think they’re invincible,” Fernandes said today at Pemandu’s Global Malaysia Series LIVE here.
“Organisations need to refresh, whether it’s political or a company. Letting go is important to ensure there is strong succession planning,” he added.
Fernandes said the difference between governments and private companies is that the latter easily adapts to change.
“If somebody (in a company) screws up, we change them immediately,” he said.
“We got to have people that can adapt to change. Malaysians don’t like change,” he reiterated.
Fernandes also urged the public to speak out when they feel that they are being marginalised.
“Don’t moan about not getting help from the government and say ‘Pemandu is not doing enough to help the people’, go out and do something about it,” he said.
“Don’t just complain behind their backs,” he added.
Government should stay out of businesses
The founder of Tune Group also believed that the government should “facilitate business” and “not be involved in them”.
“At the moment, we have civil servants sitting on the board of GLCs (government-linked companies). The big fear is that the government will get more involved in businesses,” he said.
Fernandes said the country “needs to be honest with itself” and acknowledge constructive criticisms, especially on a global level.
“We should embrace change and we need to be honest with ourselves; and where are we in the global league in transparency and accountability,” he said.
“Take education for example. We got to make sure that we are producing the best students to remain competitive. But I’m not sure if we have improved. That’s why honesty is important,” he added.
